In the earlier hours before my accident, where I destroyed my Gios, I brought home a Kestrel 200 EMS frame. I was directed to the eBay listing by one of the Sydney retro riders, and decided to get it as it was relatively cheap. Little did I know I would be building it up right away.

Now, from what I can tell, I believe this is a 1999 model. I found that the Ruby Weave colour and original EMS fork(with a titanium steerer) was released that year as per the brochure. The 200 model should be the second model Kestrel made, after the 4000 in 1987, with my frame benig made in the last years of production. The frame weighs 1225g, and fork 500g, making it the lightest frameset I own. Built up with the 105SC group from my Gios, it ends up being a 9.1kg bike.

This is what I got done today. I have a carbon post which will go on, and will need to route the rear brake housing through the top tube which will take a while tomorrow.

The frame has more paint chips than I would like, but what can I do. Im not gonna go and repaint this one. And I cant seem to shove the seatpost in any further as at the end of the aluminium insert(the seatpost bolt place) inside the frame seems to be a small lip around the edge. Im asking around on the American forums to see if that is normal or not. I sure hope it aint the remains of an old seatpost. The seatpost would be about 5 cm further down.

Fully done now. The torn Turbo replica saddle was replaced, and a braze on FD was used. The rest came straight off the Gios. The bottle cages are only temporary. I will need to wait on some silver or white cages.

The clear ruby colour shows up well in sunlight.

The frame came from Santa Barbara Bikesmiths over in California. The Castle Hill owner before me bought it off some dude from Brisbane, and thats all I know where the frame came from.

As for the seatpost issue I had, I found the reason behind it. The seat tube is made of carbon and there is an aluminum sleeve inserted into the top, which is used to clamp the seatpost.There is a cavity in the seat tube below the sleeve with a slightly larger diameter than 27.2, which allows for minor movement of the seatpost when subjected to forces when the bike is ridden. Over time, this movement can cause cracks at the top of the seat tube. If the seatpost is too short, and the bike tips over, this leverage can easily crack both the seat tube carbon at the top, and the aluminum sleeve inside. Cutting the seatpost to exact length eliminates most of this movement, and helps to avoid the cracking of the top of the carbon tube, and more importantly, the cracking of the aluminum sleeve. Guess this is something Kestrel didnt take into account, even though hey went to the lengths of wind tunnel testing for aerodynamics(first company to do so for a production frame), and FEA testing. This is why I am using the aluminium one, as opposed to cutting my carbon post.

Last edited by QuangVuong on Thu Dec 12, 2013 8:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I'm the dude in Brisbane (actually Maroochydore) he bought it from. I bought it from a girl in Brisbane and the story goes that is was her dads and she brought it over from the states to use while she was studying in Brissy. It was built with full campy record 10 speed group which is what I bought it for....it was filthy! Here was the gumtree pic...

You didn't by chance get to remove the bottom headset race off the forks on one piece did you? It looked like it had been attacked and I didn't want to stuff it up. It goes with the record headset I raided from it.

Hi guys , A newbie to your site (from sunny UK ) & I have recently acquired a really nice Kestrel 200sci in 'plum' - & as with yours, a couple more paint chips than I thought it had, but nothing serious. Can I ask , .... is it a criminal offence to kit it up in Campag ? (given the Americans ftted Shimano )& secondly ,would I de-value it by repainting it ~ all properly done with the decals etc of course ! I have a mixture of kit- mostly Campag, some noce vento wheels G' set> all chorus - an adaptor for the stem / forks for an unthreaded set up & plan to use oversized 31.6 bars,with shifters- not levers & DT gear levers ...so a bit of old & new .. any thoughts? ..At what point will folks say I've spoilt it ??? thanks - some great photos of your work by the way ! Phil ..Liverpool UK

Nothing wrong with Campag at all. Kestrels came in either a Shimano or Campag equivalent. And you can see that the previous iteration of the bike came with Record. I was gonna go with the 6700 STI levers as well, but the DT shifters popped up for cheap, so I grabbed them and they went onto the bike. The threadless stem doesn't sound the best to me aesthetically(my opinion only), but I guess it could work as the 200 does look like a much newer bike.

And as for the paint, I'd say its up to you. It is your bike, and seeing that you are gonna reproduce the decals, it'll be fine. Dunno if it'll devalue it, but if it comes up well, then you've restored it and it'll be back to a new looking condition.

And how did a Kestrel end up in the UK? Was there a distributer over there at the time? And by plum, is yours the dark red colour? Or a clear red like mine? I do look forward to seeing yours built up though.

I am also riding one of these in Melbourne. It actually belongs to my Brother in Law, from Canberra. It seems to be a pretty good ride, especially considering it's age. A bit harsh maybe, and pretty lively steering I think, but don't have a good comparison with newer carbons. I would be interested to hear opinions from anyone who has ridden one.Trying to work out how to drop a pic into here! R